PASS FAKE: Chris Koutsoutis allegedly forged grade changes while working as an administrator for dean John Elliott.J.C. Rice

GRADUATE DEGREE BURN: Baruch College’s business school, at its Midtown campus, has been rocked by grade-fixing in its accelerated “executive” master’s program.

GRADUATE DEGREE BURN: Baruch College’s business school, at its Midtown campus, has been rocked by grade-fixing in its accelerated “executive” master’s program.

While teaching how corporations cook their books, a CUNY business school was fixing grades.

An administrator at Baruch College’s prestigious Zicklin School of Business forged professors’ names to raise the grade point averages of students seeking master’s degrees to become dealmakers and corporate leaders, The Post has learned.

An internal CUNY probe found the course grades of “approximately 15 students” were falsified to keep their GPAs high enough to stay in the programs, Baruch officials acknowledged.

The trickery prevented enrollees, including many mid-level Wall Streeters whose firms picked up their tabs, from flunking out — and kept their fat tuition checks flowing in.

The accelerated “executive programs” in business and finance allow students to earn a master’s degree in 10 to 22 months while working full-time.

The tuition: $45,000 to $75,000.

“It was done for money,” an insider said of the scam. “They get a lot more money from those students. They don’t want to lose these people, so they changed their grades.”

Baruch has referred the matter to law-enforcement agencies, the college said in a statement. Spokeswoman Christina Latouf would not say if students knew their grades were being changed or were complicit in the scheme.

But Baruch has started calling some recent graduates with disturbing news: Their sheepskins are invalid.

“What do you mean? My diploma’s on my wall. How can you tell me I don’t have a degree?” one grad said, according to a source.

“I won’t have a comment about that,” Koutsoutis said when confronted by The Post at his home in Flushing, Queens.

Professors submit students’ final grades electronically. Any change requires the submission of a “change of grade” form in which a professor gives a reason for the revision and signs his or her name. The form also requires the approval and signature of supervisors.

The CUNY probe also found “forged contracts,” officials said. Koutsoutis inked contracts with vendors who made travel and other arrangements for class trips to cities such as Milan, Copenhagen and Rio de Janeiro.

Koutsoutis would not comment on the forged contracts except to deny he profited from them.

“All I will say is whatever allegations that I did it for financial gain, they are false,” he said. “No students, faculty or administrators gave me any money. I never took any freebies. I was offered trips but never took any.”

Koutsoutis, who worked at Zicklin for 11 years, was “removed” last August, Latouf said. Sources say he was escorted out of his office at the college’s 24th Street campus.

Koutsoutis said he wasn’t terminated but retired.

“They did not like the way I was doing my job, and we mutually agreed I should leave,” he said, adding he stayed on the payroll until February to cash in unused vacation and sick days.

Others connected to the scandal are facing disciplinary charges or leaving quietly.

The dean of the Zicklin School, John Elliott — who directly supervised Koutsoutis — quietly resigned to take a job as dean of the University of Connecticut’s business school, starting in August.

Elliott did not return a call for comment. A UConn spokesman would not say whether Elliott informed them of the Zicklin mess.

Baruch President Mitchel Wallerstein told the Faculty Senate about the forgery scandal at a meeting in March.

“The college believes the grade changes were intended to keep some students’ GPAs high enough to remain in the programs,” Wallerstein said, according to minutes of the meeting.

If students do not earn a 3.0 or “B” average each trimester, they can be put on probation or kicked out. Before each trimester, students must pay tuition installments of $11,000 to $13,500.

The total cost of the 10-month executive MS in finance program is now $44,000. The 10-month executive MS in financial statement analysis is $45,000, and the 22-month executive MBA program costs $75,000. Books, meals for night and Saturday classes and a trip abroad are included.

“This is a profit center for the university,” a Zicklin alumnus said.

But the programs were found in such disarray that Baruch has put them “in receivership,” taking them over from Zicklin, the faculty was told.

The business school is named after investment manager Larry Zicklin, who donated $18 million to the institution in 1997 and made a $2 million endowment to its Center For Corporate Integrity.

Zicklin, who worked for the asset-management firm Neuberger Berman, could not be reached for comment last week.

Zicklin officials gave a sales pitch for prospective students last week, but directors and professors made no mention of the problems.

Instead, they promised “respected and well-recognized” degrees that would put grads on the path to become chief executives and financial officers.

“This is a master’s program on steroids,” one said.

“If you’re not up to the challenge, shy away now.”

The financial statement analysis program teaches students how to ferret out financial malfeasance.

“We want to know what the accountants are doing, and how they are cooking the books,” professor Al Ghosh, the program’s academic director, told prospective students at the session.

The highlight of the programs is the trip to learn about business in other countries.

“We had a blast,” a rookie prof said of the experience. “You can go for drinks at night without worrying about your wife and children waiting for you at home.”

The college is now “tightening its management oversight to ensure the integrity and quality of the programs going forward.”

One professor said the college has begun sending them confirmations of grade changes to ensure that alterations are not made without their knowledge.

A faculty committee will examine cases of students whose grades were forged and give them the chance to complete any work required to earn their diplomas.

“The college does not currently anticipate that it will be necessary to rescind degrees because of this unfortunate incident,” Baruch said.

But a recent grad of the executive finance program told The Post she’s livid the scandal may discredit her degree, which she says she earned without cheating and for which she paid $42,000.